Book Being Reviewed:
Barkley, R. A. (1997). Defiant children: A clinician's manual for assessment and parent training (2nd Ed.). New York, NY: Guilford.

Reviewer:
Nicole Adamson

Curricular Areas:
Helping Relationships/Counseling Theory, Marital/Couple/Family Counseling

Subject Headings:
Family dynamics

Review:
The Barkley Parent Management Training Program is a valuable tool for understanding and correcting unhelpful behavior in young clients and their families. This book is based upon behavioral theory and focuses on increasing positive praise and reinforcement while reducing the use of punishment for children who display disruptive behavior. The program pays special attention to family dynamics, parent characteristics, and child personality traits. The participation of all family members in therapy is required and the program emphasizes the necessity of parent and child investment. The text describes a plan of action that is ideal for helping disruptive children and their parents regain behavioral control; specific pieces of the program can be used at the clinician’s discretion according to the severity of the clients’ needs. The detail of the text carefully guides the clinician through addressing and treating disruptive behavior, but the identified client and his or her family is ultimately responsible for the success of treatment. Once a clinician has a firm understanding of Barkley’s program, he or she will be able to adapt the text to fit the individual needs of a wide range of clientele.

The author noted that this program works best with young children, but can be used with families who have children as old as twelve years. The first chapter delivers empirical support for the behavior-based program and background information to increase the counselor’s understanding of the theory. This section is especially important for a clinician because it presents a foundation for the remainder of the book and provides a rationale for the specific interventions recommended by the author. The second section of the book represents the practical application of Barkley’s theory. Based upon his understanding of family dynamics and individual characteristics, the author has outlined a 10-step procedure that can be divided into as many family sessions as necessary or incorporated into a parenting-skills group.

Before implementing the program as it is outlined in the text, a clinician will need to use the assessment tools found in part three of the book. These tools allow the clinician, client, and family to gain a clear understanding of the origin of the child’s difficult behaviors. The clinician can then determine how the ten-step program will be used to re-formulate the family’s interactions. Before the assessments are administered and while they are being interpreted, the clinician will be able to call upon the information provided in section one in order to keep the family invested in the goals of treatment. The final section of the book includes all parent handouts that will be needed throughout the ten-step program. Overall, this text is skillfully written, easy to read, and extremely interesting. It can be used by clinicians as a reference material or as a practical therapeutic guide for treatment.

Originally posted on 8/19/2010 at csi-net.org